By the time I turned myself in I was pretty run down. No electrolytes at all. My hands and face were chapped and I had a lot of scratches but I was as lucid as I have ever been, clear and attentive. I watched each person who came and talked to me and could almost see the flames licking up around them. I was held as a possible terrorism suspect. Grace and Miro were so proud they could barely stand it. Like it was lefty Christmas just for them. Viva North Pole Libre…

Download: ZAZEN, Chapter 29 — “Della’s Mosaic” (pdf)

The Story: It’s the very near-future, somewhere in the Pacific Northwest—or a neighborhood near you. 27-year-old Della Mylinek has suffered some kind of breakdown after failing to stop the construction of a local Walmart. In an attempt to regain psychological, financial and emotional stability, she’s moved in with her brother and his pregnant wife and taken a job waiting tables at a vegan restaurant. But her anger remains, and one thing leads to another…

“Zazen” Keywords: geology, veganism, the apocalypse, urban planning, yoga, sex parties, bombs, anarchism, aging new-left revolutionaries, strip malls, paleontology, dark hippies, transcendentalism, lavender hair dye.

The Author: Vanessa Veselka is a writer and musician living in Portland, Oregon. She has been, at various times, a teenage runaway, a sex-worker, a union organizer, a student of paleontology, an expatriate, an independent record label owner, a train-hopper, a waitress and a mother. Her work has appeared in Bust, Bitch, Maximum Rock ’n’ Roll, Yeti Magazine and Tin House. Zazen is her first novel. She is online at vanessaveselka.wordpress.com

The Serial: ZAZEN concludes on Friday, December 11 with Chapter 30.

Previous chapters available for download after the jump…

ZAZEN, Chapter 28 — “The Skateboard Sutta” (pdf)
ZAZEN, Chapter 27 — “Batholith” (pdf)
ZAZEN, Chapter 26 — “Road to Laos” (pdf)
ZAZEN, Chapter 25 — “La Rue des Oiseux” (pdf)
ZAZEN, Chapter 24 — “Hazard Maps”
ZAZEN, Chapter 23 — “Disco” (pdf)
ZAZEN, Chapter 22 — “Deer Teeth” (pdf)
ZAZEN, Chapter 21 — “Into the Snow” (62k, pdf)
ZAZEN, Chapter 20 — “Dancehall” (pdf, 99k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 19 — “The Sea Goat” (pdf, 57k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 18 — “Grace Mountain” (pdf)
ZAZEN, Chapter 17 — “The Avalanche Cabin” (pdf, 66k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 16 — “Breath of Soldiers” (pdf, 83k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 15 — “Head of John the Baptist” (pdf, 75k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 14 — “Two Rivers” (pdf, 84k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 13 — “Manifestation” (pdf, 94k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 12 — “Colony of the Elect” (pdf, 58k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 11 — “Church of Enlightened Capital” (pdf, 65k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 10 — “Venus Rodere” (pdf, 64k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 9 — “The Rat Queen” (pdf, 87k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 8 — “Lagerstätte” (pdf, 61k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 7 — “Cherry Blossoms” (pdf, 75k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 6 — “Aerial Map of Carnage” (pdf, 76k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 5 — “1 800 buy COAL” (pdf, 88k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 4 — “Asian Market” (pdf, 56k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 3 — “New Haiku” (pdf, 64k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 2 — “Pregnant Rats” (pdf, 81k)
ZAZEN, Chapter 1 — “Burning Ants” (pdf, 79k)